FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT LAKE HURON - PAGE 2

A graduate student got the $64,000 question right, but a game show called it wrong. Now ABC's new quiz show, "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?," is making up for its prime-time goof by giving David Honea another shot at becoming a millionaire. Honea, 31, a doctoral student in computer engineering from Raleigh, had won $32,000 on the new show. But his bid for $1 million, taped Wednesday and broadcast Thursday night, ended with a question asking which of the Great Lakes is the second largest in area after Lake Superior.

With Walter Payton standing by, movie tough-guy Chuck Norris took the helm Thursday as the dynamic duo set out on a mission: to set a world speedboat record. Too bad the boat didn`t have the same endurance that allowed Payton to set the NFL all-time record for running the football. In orange helmets and life jackets, the pair sped off at 7:03 a.m. for an "assault on the Great Lakes," a 605-mile journey to Detroit. To set the record, they had to arrive in less than 12 hours 34 minutes 41 seconds, the record set in 1983 by Michael Reagan, son of the former president.

Smelt runs continued to build and Lake Huron brown trout catches were at their most productive level this year, AAA Michigan reported Wednesday. Southeast Michigan and Saginaw Bay perch action was excellent, and steelhead runs were peaking in the Muskegon River near Muskegon, the auto club said in its weekly state fishing report. West Michigan smelt activity was fair along the Lake Michigan shore off piers at Pentwater, Manistee and Frankfort. Lake Michigan brown trout activity was fair with various baits from Benton Harbor to Frankfort.

Former Bears star Walter Payton and martial arts expert Chuck Norris will combine their talents Thursday in a speed-boating benefit for the United Way. They will try to break the record for driving a powerboat from Chicago to Detroit. The record was set in 1983 by Michael Reagan, son of former President Ronald Reagan. Payton and Norris will pilot a 46-foot Scarab over Lake Michigan and Lake Huron with two other crew members. The venture will begin at 7 a.m. at Navy Pier and end at Hart Plaza.

Camp food in the late `50s had nothing to do with s`mores, swankee frankies or corn-on-the-cob dripping with butter. That rite of summer, going to camp, eluded me. My family had a cottage on Lake Huron. Not to be considered "out of it" with my peers who got to go to camp, I always referred to our cottage as Camp Karrer, named after my grandparents. Food at Camp Karrer was unbelievable. It was made by cousins, a half dozen of us ranging in age from seven to 11. Fat Tommy, now thin and an undertaker, made long Johns shaped like torpedos.

Dear Tom, Someone told me that Lake Michigan and Lake Huron are really one lake. Is this true? --Ken Cleys, Woodridge Dear Ken, Though they have long been considered to be two different lakes, geologically and hydrologically, Lake Michigan and Lake Huron are actually one lake joined at the Straits of Mackinac. They lie at the same surface elevation, 577 feet, both lakes' level rise and fall together and flow of water between the lakes can reverse through the straits.

State parks are establishing pet-free zones at seven sites this year. Dogs are one of the most common reasons why overnight campers get kicked out of campgrounds, park officials say. "We evict campers who can't control their pets," said Gary Williams of Hoeft State Park, on Lake Huron near Rogers City. "And if you ask me, I haven't done it as often as I should have." The most common complaint is the noise dogs make, followed by the mess they leave, Booth Newspapers said in a recent story.

A thunderstorm cut visibility to a few feet immediately after Saturday's start of the Port Huron-to-Mackinac Island sailboat race but the 286 boats otherwise encountered light winds, race chairman Russ Nutter said. The storm created a jam of spectator boats seeking shelter in the Black River in Port Huron. Nutter said he received no reports of damage to boats in the race. "We had a pretty good storm blow through right after the start but we didn`t lose anybody, and life goes on," he said.

Heavy surf on Sunday foiled Jim Dreyer's quest to swim across Lake Huron to Canada. Dreyer, 35, who swam across Lake Michigan last summer, slipped into the water near Port Hope around dawn Sunday. Heavy surf, coupled with forecasts for winds that could whip up 6 foot to 10 foot waves, prompted Dreyer's trainer and the boat's captain to pull him back on the boat after about an hour in the lake, a spokesman said in a taped statement. The Byron Center man, a self-employed marketer, hoped to try again Monday morning, the spokesman said.

The Chicago Tribune's Travel section has won two first-place awards in the 1999 Society of American Travel Writers' Central States Travel Writing Contest. The awards were for work done in 1998. Staff writer Alan Solomon's "Around the Mitten" (Aug. 9, 1998) was selected as the best newspaper article on U.S./Canada. In the story, part of the ongoing Great American Drives series, Solomon followed the shorelines of Lake Michigan and Lake Huron, taking the long way around Michigan to get to Detroit.